Breather Resist:Thrasher Interview

IT'S A STORY THAT SOUNDS ALL TOO FAMILIAR, but it bears repeating: "If I didn't start skateboarding, then I would've never gotten into punk rock or started playing music at all," Breather Resist guitarist Evan Patterson said.--Guy Gray

"I remember when I was 10; I went down to the Schwinn shop, which luckily sold skate stuff, and the potheads that worked there told me to buy G&S Footage. I got that video, and Duane Pitre skating to Dinosaur Jr just did it for me. Neil Blender, too. All that shit. And from there on 'til about 16 I skated non-stop, I didn't go anywhere without a skateboard. Now I concentrate on music more so I don't skate as much, but it's still with me. I live two blocks from the park and it's fucking amazing." The skatepark that Patterson refers to is Louisville, Kentucky, and the music he plays is with the acerbic post-hardcore outfit Breather Resist, taking their moniker from a song title by the legendary Hoover.

Admittedly, Breather Resist does its fair share of borrowing from other bands, but its members have managed to meld the disparate sources into a sound all their own, a sound that is nothing less than sonic mayhem. Picture Coalesce's cerebral pugnacity colliding with the skull thumping grooves of the Jesus Lizard and you have half the picture. Coat that carnage with a nocturnal sheen of reverberating despair a la Hoover, and you have something unique. You have Breather Resist.

"I think we take hints from those bands," Patterson said, "but with the combination of all of our individual styles and the way Steve [Sindoni] sings, and especially the volume of our band live, I think it comes out as something different." As for the Hoover influence, he's unabashedly candid. "It's funny, because I think my second or third show was a Hoover show," he remembered. "I've always been a huge fan, always been more of a Hoover fan than a Fugazi fan. They've always kind of stuck with me. I can relate to their songs more for some reason."

Being that music is an art form, Patterson said he chooses it as a way of connecting with others. "Our singer has had a rough time with his family," Patterson explained. "Our band is equally about trying to find other people that can relate to what we're doing, aside from just writing creative songs."

Fortunately for Patterson and company, Breather Resist succeeds on both fronts admirably. To illustrate, consider "Loose Lipped Error" off their extraordinary second LP, Charmer. This song is an exercise in the art of purposefully building up pressure in order to release it. The understated but airtight rhythm section of Nick Thieneman and Geoff Paton accomplish this wonderfully, as they deftly create a slow and menacing build up that Patterson coats in haunting guitar atmospherics. The release, or more exactly, the explosion, is where singer Steve Sindoni shines, disdainfully spewing out sordid images of a verbally abusive father. As is the case with many of the songs on the album, the music is relentlessly honest, dynamic and uncompromising.

Armed with songs of such high caliber, it should be easy for Breather Resist to cut their own path their own way. Patterson expresses contempt towards bands too eager to cut a major label deal, or who otherwise fall to meaningfully reach out because they don't know where they came from. "I'm not saying I don't want our band to be popular," he explains, "but you have to do it on your own terms. Now, punk rock is such a marketable thing. Skateboarding too. It's sad to see people lose sight of what's important to them. Again, if I hadn't started skateboarding, I would never have started playing music. And that put so much stuff in perspective for me, from politics to just my general lifestyle, the ethics of being yourself, you know?"

Louisville, Kentucky has long had a tradition of producing some of the finest and most influential bands in independent music, hardcore or otherwise. To a list that contains such notables as Slint, Kinghorse, Palace Music, Rachel's, and Rodan, now add Breather Resist.